Film

September 02, 2015

Between the political crisis and an economic downturn, Brazil is going through a rough patch. It's easy to forget that the gears of change are slowly and quietly continuing to grind away. The film "The Second Mother," or "Que Horas Ela Volta?" (What Time Does She Get Home?) helps remind audiences of this important reality that Brazil is changing for the better, and may not always be held hostage to its history.

The film - this year's Academy Awards submission from Brazil - follows Val, a live-in maid from the Northeast working for a wealthy family in São Paulo. It's "Neighboring Sounds" meets "The Help," though I suspect with a black protagonist, it would have been an entirely different movie altogether. The movie is out now in Brazilian theaters and is showing in a limited release in the United States.

Regina Casé plays Val, and she's perfect. Having honed her comedic skills over decades and dedicated part of her career to spotlighting Brazil's poor and working classes, she truly incarnates the role and beautifully depicts a position that has evolved as a remnant of slavery.

While this is a very Brazilian story, it's also a fundamentally Latin American story. It brings to mind women who leave their children in another region or in a whole other country, from Paraguayan domestics in Argentina to Central American maids in the United States. Brazilians and anyone who has spent significant time in Brazil likely knows a Val, and will recognize her mannerisms and personality in Casé's character.

Directed by a woman, Anna Muylaert, the movie also touches on universal issues like motherhood, feminism, the generation gap, and social class divisions. It's this last piece - the deep social divide and the daily indignities Val faces - that are so uncomfortable to witness that I was squirming in my seat.

Expertly filmed, the movie makes the audience feel like it's in Val's shoes, with narrow shots of hallways and doorways, giving one a very keen sense of both the physical and social boundaries within a single home. It's only when Val's daughter, Jéssica, shows up, that we see the realm the family lives in, rather than the confines of the kitchen or the claustrophobic bedroom where Val sleeps. Jéssica refuses to abide by the unspoken rules, taking up in the guest room, eating in the dining room, and most controversially, swimming in the pool.

"A person is born knowing her position," Val scolds her daughter. "When they offer you something of theirs, they're being polite. They know we'll say no."

Jéssica represents a new generation of Brazilians and the new middle class, breaking boundaries (literally), getting a higher education, and flouting norms and expectations for what a person of little means can do with her life.

Still, the treatment that Bárbara, the woman of the house, gives Val and her daughter, seem unfortunately realistic. "You're nearly family!" Bárbara tells Val at one point, sandwiched between growing humiliations to which she subjects her. The Twitter account A Minha Empregada (My Maid) reveals precisely these types of views and treatment of maids.

What the film hints at but ultimately doesn't show is that the landscape for domestic work in Brazil is changing dramatically.

Brazil has close to 7 million domestic workers, more than any country in the world. But the rules of the game changed in 2013, when a constitutional amendment passed that gave a host of rights to domestic workers, including a minimum wage, a maximum number of working hours, overtime, lunch breaks, and social security. Plus, in recent years, some women have been leaving the profession to get an education or change careers. With salaries rising, it's no longer as common that maids live with families, as women opt to commute. And because workers are more expensive to hire, some families no longer have full-time maids. And in São Paulo, some upper-class homes are no longer built with maid's quarters.

Still, it's precisely this hope for change that makes the movie work, ending with a sense of redemption.

At one point in the film, Jéssica announces her plan to go to university to study architecture at one of the best schools in the country. Bárabara lifts an eyebrow and in a voice dripping with condescension and a hint of resentment, says: "See? Our country really is changing."

July 23, 2014

Batalha do Passinho, a documentary about Rio's passinho dance craze and the city's passinho dance competition, has come to New York.

The documentary debuted on July 22 at Lincoln Center Out of Doors, and was followed by a passinho dance party featuring dancers from the film. Even though they flew in this morning, the dancers still managed to wow the crowd and even teach their moves to curious partygoers. The movie will be shown again on August 2 at the Film Society at Lincoln Center, and the passinho dancers will perform at Lincoln Center Out of Doors on July 24 and July 26.

I've been following the passinho craze for awhile, and interviewed the documentary's director last year. The movie is an excellent way to learn about the dance and how it's become a cultural phenomenon in Rio. But for international audiences, here's some extra context that may help you understand more about the dance's significance and why it's a big deal that it's being featured in New York.

Funk, the music that passinho is set to, has been around for awhile but has had a complicated history. Akin to rap, it's had a stigma signifying poverty and violence attached to it, despite its popularity. Even though wealthy youth sometimes attend funk parties in favelas, a person who likes funk, a funkeiro, is associated with a person who lives in a favela. For this reason, it is a huge deal that funk and passinho are being featured at Lincoln Center, the stage for some of the world's greatest music and dance companies.

The film doesn't delve too deeply into the dancers' lives, but the truth is that it's refreshing to see a documentary focused on Rio's favelas that's not devoted to poverty and violence. The fact is, though, that passinho represents a potential opportunity for young people who get involved in the scene, and an alternative to another dominant force in their communities: drug trafficking. One of the dancers says in the film that his "dream is to be recognized," which to me sounded like not only recognizing his dancing but also recognition for being more than just a favelado, a kid from a favela.

Another element that I found interesting about the passinho is how it's a reflection of other elements of Brazilian culture: a fusion of styles incorporating foreign and Brazilian influences.

The next important thing to know is that passinho's transition from becoming popular in the favelas and being picked up by major media was a huge step. Xuxa, one of the country's most famous entertainers, featured several of the dancers on her show, as shown in the film; and Globo, the country's biggest media conglomerate and TV station, has showcased the dance on numerous shows. One of them is Esquenta, a show that has brought favela culture and issues to mainstream audiences. In some of these cases, dancers speak openly about where they're from. Just a few years ago, "the idea of asking someone what favela they were from, on national television, was unthinkable," wrote Rio Real blog's Julia Michaels last year.

Passinho also reveals the shifts taking place in Brazil, notably conspicuous consumption by the new middle class and the power of digital inclusion. The film highlights the fashion and aesthetic styles associated with passinho, which recalls funk ostentatação, or ostentatious funk, where performers sing about consumption and fans seek expensive name brands to imitate artists. Plus, this type of consumption is part of being a member of Brazil's new middle class. And finally, passinho owes its quick spread to social networks like Orkut and Facebook and videos on Youtube. With more young people having access to the internet and smartphones, passinho not only spread throughout Rio, but also in Brazil. Plus, internet exposure from artists like Ricky Martin featuring passinho dancers have helped bring the dance worldwide.

June 08, 2014

In 2002, a Brazilian movie called City of God was released. It was filmed in Rio's favelas with favela residents as actors. It became an international phenomenon, and was nominated for four Oscars. And since then, there hasn't been a Brazilian film with the same commercial success in the United States since, nor a Brazilian movie that has managed to loom so large in the American imagination about Brazil.

As the World Cup is set to begin, the image of the favela is firmly entrenched in the U.S. coverage of the event, be it the news or commercials. Favelas have been in the foreign spotlight even before the film (think: Michael Jackson), but "favela chic" and the fascination with favela imagery is a clear part of City of God's legacy.

A few have saw their careers take off, like Seu Jorge and Alice Braga, and others managed to build acting or showbusiness careers in Brazil. But the majority of actors interviewed in the film are living similar lives. Some have become family men; others are just scraping by. A number were arrested for robbery or involvement in the drug trade; one is presumed dead. One man is selling peanuts and hoping to kick off a music career.

Like the actors, Rio's favelas have undergone changes in the time since City of God came out. Pacification has meant that some communities have seen a drop in homicides, though a rise in disappearances and other types of crimes mean the overall result has yet to be defined. A huge socioeconomic shift brought millions into the middle class, meaning that nearly two-thirds of Brazilian favela residents are considered part of the "new middle class." With the development of mobile technology, cheaper phones mean that 90 percent of the new middle class owns a cell. That means homes in favelas are much more likely to now have TVs, computers, and electronics than back in 2002, and a growing number of favela residents are getting access to education and better jobs.

Still, the concepts that City of God cemented are ones that haven't changed much as far as foreign perceptions of favelas. There's still this romanticized or demonized notion of favelas that you'll continue to see throughout the World Cups. Do favelas still suffer from violence, drug trafficking, and poverty? Yes. But they're also an important part of how Brazilian society is transforming.

With this in mind, last month I agreed to be a volunteer writer and translator for Voz da Comunidade, a community news site based in Rio's Complexo do Alemão, run by Rene Silva. My first piece, a translation of my Ingrid Silva profile, ran last week. I agreed to contribute through writing New York stories and doing English translations of Rene's reporting because not only will it be fun to write for a Brazilian audience, but I also think there's a great benefit to getting Rene's coverage to a larger international audience.

Because while violence is an unfortunate reality, there's so much going on and Rene and his staff are able to report from within the community. It's important that foreigners realize that some things haven't changed in Rio's favelas, but thanks to technology and the socioeconomic shift, residents are telling their own stories every day.

September 25, 2013

With October almost upon us, here are five things happening next month to watch for in Brazil.

5. Domestic Smartphone Apps: Starting in October, smartphones that qualify for government tax breaks must come with at least 5 Brazilian-made apps. In order to receive a tax break--making the smartphones cheaper for consumers--the phone must have 3G, wifi, and an operationing system that allows third-party apps; must be produced in Brazil; must cost less than $1,500; and must have 5 Brazilian apps pre-installed or shown to the user with the possibility for download. The domestic app requirement will be increased over time and by the end of 2014, the requirement will go up to 50 Brazilian apps. These apps must be in Portuguese, can deal with anything ranging from education to public services to games, and must be approved by the Ministry of Communications. Learn more here

3. Internet Constitution: After President Dilma Rousseff put a rush on the country's proposed "Internet Constitution" in September following the NSA spying revelations, Congress will have to vote on the legislation next month. Along with requirements for local data storage of websites like Facebook and Google, the bill also guarantees net neutrality. Learn more here

2. Mining Code: Brazil's Congress is slated to vote on the country's new mining code between October 15 and 20. (There's a chance it will be stuck in the House for awhile, though) The legislation will be the first change to the country's mining rules since the 1960s. Learn more here

1. Oil Auction: The long-awaited auction of Brazil's Libra pre-salt oil field--estimated to hold billions of barrels of oil--takes place on October 21. Eleven companies are signed up for the auction. Petrobras, Brazil's state oil company which has a 30 percent stake in the field, turns 60 in October. Learn more here

May 27, 2013

Though Rio's favelas have long been a symbol of poverty and their people considered outsiders by the city's wealthier residents, favela culture is slowly gaining inroads in Rio and even Brazilian culture. For a long time, funk parties were the exception, sometimes drawing middle- and upper-class partygoers to the favelas. But funk was still seen by many as an inferior musical genre, something belonging to the city's poor. Favela residents would often fear revealing their home address to potential employers, and some still do. For a long time, there was a stigma attached to living in a favela.

But to some extent, that's changing. Salve Jorge, a popular Globo novela that just ended, prominently featured characters from Rio's Complexo de Alemão favela, including real people like Renê Silva. Esquenta, a Globo program which often features culture and residents from favelas, recently brought on children from a Rio favela to the show. The host, Regina Casé, asked them which communities they were from. "Maybe only two years ago, the idea of asking someone what favela they were from, on national television, was unthinkable," writes Rio Real blog's Julia Michaels.

And now, a full-length documentary called "Batalha do Passinho" or "Battle of the Passinho," hits Brazilian theaters next month. It details the makings of a cultural movement born in Rio's favelas, featuring young people who developed a new dance form set to funk music. I spoke to Emílio Domingos, director of the film, about the movie and the passinho.

The passinho, or little step, is a combination of dances like break dancing and pop-and-lock, along with traditional Brazilian dances like samba and frevo. It's almost always improvised, and like break dancing, involves dancers facing off against one another. Started in 2011, a competition called Batalha do Passinho seeks to find the best passinho dancer. "When I saw a boy do frevo to funk [music], incorporating elements from capoeira, I was sure there was a cultural revolution going on," Julio Ludemir, the creator of the competition, toldFolha. The competition is different from funk parties, late-night affairs sometimes attended by heavily armed drug traffickers. The event attracts families and dancers alike, and the show is now sponsored by the Ministry of Culture and Coca Cola, among other entities. In the final round, 16 dancers go up against each other for 45 seconds. The final of the most recent competition was broadcast one of Brazil's most watched weekend programs on Globo. The winner, a 16-year old from Nova Iguaçu, won R$20,000, which he said he would use to take a class and help his mom.

Domingos, who earned a degree in social sciences from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, has worked for a long time with funk culture in Rio. For over a decade, he was a DJ for a funk party featuring international and Brazilian hip hop and "black music," and has worked on research for documentaries since 1997. He made his first film in 2000, looking at Rio's hip hop scene, and has made a total of 11 movies, several about funk music and culture. He also directs music videos, and works as a researcher on Esquenta. His latest film project is directing a film about the Vasco da Gama soccer team, slated for release later this year.

"Batalha do Passinho" came about when Domingos was asked to be a judge at the competition. He'd seen the dance on Youtube beginning in 2008, but hadn't been to the competition. "I was really impressed with their movement, because it was fast and sophisticated," said Domingos. But he wanted to learn more about the dancers, and decided to make a short film. He ended up with a full-length documentary.

Domingos wants to bring the passinho to a larger audience. "The culture of the passinho is an expansive thing that brings together youth from different places, who often live far away from each other," said the director. It's not just a style of dance, but is also evidence of growing digital inclusion in favelas and a chance for social mobility. "They created a strategy to disseminate the passinho," explained Domingos. "Youtube is essential for them." Using the online video site, dancers not only developed an audience in Brazil and beyond, but used it as a place for debating, discussing, and learning the dance. The dancers tend to use basic technology, such as cell phone cameras and point-and-shoot cameras. The internet is so important for spreading the dance, said Domingos, that some who qualify for the competition had never been to a dance or performance before, learning the steps entirely online.

Changing one's reality is also important to dancers. Many of the young men work and do the dance as a hobby, hoping to turn it into a full-time source of income. "The big challenge is to transform this visibility into financial recognition...it's difficult," said Domingos. Some dancers say they spurned selling drugs in order to dedicate themselves to the dance.

The other goal of the film is to change people's minds about funk and those who are part of the culture. Domingos explained that some are prejudiced against not only those who live in favelas, but funk music itself. One of the first things that happens when police pacify a favela is to ban funk parties. Despite the popularity of passinho videos online, comments reveal how some people view the dance and music. "I never really understood the criminalization that people attribute to funk," said Domingos. "It's a story of what's happening."

The passinho competition and the movie have had success in changing people's minds. "A part of society is quite surprised by the passinho, with its sophistication," said Domingos. He always brings those featured in the movie to screenings so audience members can meet them. "[The dancers] are
conscious of the artistic power of the passinho," Domingos said.

However, the reality of Rio's favelas is a part of the story, too. One of the young men Domingos featured in the film was murdered last year, likely by security guards. Domingos says he was an icon who developed his own style, and was called the "King of the Passinho." Though he worked in manual labor at night, he was starting to get paid opportunities to dance. The movie is something of an homage to him, Domingos noted.

March 24, 2013

Maria Farinha Filmes, the company behind 2012's "Way Beyond Weight" (Muito Além do Peso), released the movie on Vimeo recently, so it's available for worldwide viewing.

The film sheds light on Brazil's child obesity epidemic, ranging from this terrifying statistic about infant soda consumption to the fact that on average, Brazilian kids spend three hours per day in school and five hours per day watching TV. The movie also looks at the fact that obesity in general is a growing problem in Brazil. It points out, for example, that Brazilians consume an average of 112 pounds of sugar a year.

But perhaps what's most interesting about the movie is putting Brazil's obesity epidemic into a global perspective as a result of deepening globalization. While interviewing Brazilians across the country from all levels of the socioeconomic spectrum, the movie also includes foreign voices, including people from the United States, the United Kingdom, China, and Mexico, among others. One Brazilian observer explains her perspective that a country is defined by the food it eats, and that it is not necessarily a good thing to be able to go anywhere in the world and eat the same exact thing. There's also an interesting point that applies to other large growing economies: parents sometimes send unhealthy processed food for children's school meals to show off a new ability to consume, and giving kids products they may not have had access to when they were young.

February 13, 2013

Kleber Mendonça Filho is the kind of writer who believes you should write what you know. His latest film "Neighboring Sounds," which he wrote and directed, takes place in his hometown of Recife, and most was shot on his block and even in his own home. But he's also a fan of horror movies and science fiction. He's made short films of both genres, from "A menina do algodão" (2002), based on a local legend, to "Recife Frio" (2009), a fantastic mockumentary about a cold spell that takes over the northern Brazilian city. He's one of the most exciting directors in Brazil at the moment, one who's changing the course of Brazilian cinema.

I interviewed Mendonça in Recife by phone after meeting him briefly in New York, where he came to promote his new movie and accept the award for best film of the year from Cinema Tropical. "Neighboring Sounds" has won accolades the world over, including being named one of the best movies of 2012 by The New York Times. A movie programmer in Recife and a former movie critic, Mendonça told me he wanted to make a film that he would like to watch. From the perspective of a viewer, Mendonça wanted to focus on what he calls "small-scale incidents," the day-to-day occurrences that make up daily life. "I've never been involved in shootouts, and I don't carry guns," he said. "My life is interesting enough." The movie focuses largely on the daily lives of middle- and upper-class families living in Recife, and their relationships with their working-class employees.

The Middle Class as a Protagonist

Mendonça noted that Brazil's middle class is not normally part of Brazilian cinema. At a January screening of the director's short films at New York's Museum of the Moving Image, he explained there's now a "huge discussion going on" since the new movie showed an intimacy with this group. The film also zeroes in on class tensions, which Mendonça said are part of Brazilian society and "make Brazilians tic." "For me, it's obvious because it's part of our lives," he said. In several of his films, Mendonça spotlights the maid's room, which can be found in many Brazilian homes and evolved from slave quarters.

For Mendonça, it was natural to focus on the middle class, since that's where he comes from. "That's what I understand," he told me. "I'm familiar with the way people think and behave." He said many people told him how much they identified with situations in the film. "That's what the arts are all about, really; they tell you something about what you understand or something that you feel," he noted. But he was taken aback that people thought the film was original for focusing on this group. "There's nothing revolutionary about this," he said. "It baffles me." He cited a film called "O Invasor" (The Trespasser) that influenced his work, and touches on similar themes. When he saw it a decade ago, he wondered: "Why don't we make films like that?"

Brazil's Frenzy of Consumerism

"Neighboring Sounds," as well as the 2005 short "Eletrodoméstica," were inspired in part by the boom in consumerism after the Real Plan in 1994. Mendonça was first struck by the phenomenon during a family trip to the United States in the early 1990s when he saw Brazilians bringing piles of VCRs, microwaves, and fax machines back to Brazil. He was also struck by an incident involving the winning Brazilian team during the 1994 World Cup in Los Angeles: the players and entourage brought home 17 tons of baggage filled with purchases after their win.

Before inflation was conquered and imports opened up, Brazil had a "strange kind of capitalism that was very similar to life in communism," Mendonça said. "I remember a time when you would go to the supermarket in the morning
and in the afternoon, the prices would have gone up." There were very few choices when it came to buying electronics or cars, but after 1994, he began noticing people "going crazy with consumerism." Even though things have changed since then, Mendonça noted, Brazil still has a developing consumer culture, with new money coming in and a growing C class.

Breaking the Mold of a Domestic Film

With a limited budget, "Neighboring Sounds" has had success because people are discovering the film, which Mendonça admits doesn't usually happen. "It's slowly stepping out of the place where the market says it’s supposed to be and supposed to stay," he said. The film was well-received in Brazil, which isn't always the case. The term filme nacional, or domestic film, could sometimes be spoken as a derogatory term. A recent Carta Capital article declared Brazil a "cultural wasteland," with the exception of "Neighboring Sounds." Mendonça disagreed with this assessment, but noted that this perception of Brazilian films does exist. On Twitter, he's seen people comment on the movie, saying, "Well, it's nacional, but it's actually quite good," or "It's so good that it feels like an Argentine film." The solution, Mendonça believes, is to create more good movies and to expose viewers to different kinds of films. "Cinema is many different voices in the whole world, not only American or Hollywood voices," he said.

Connecting History to the Present

One important element of "Neighboring Sounds" is a clear connection between the past to the present, from showing black and white photos at the beginning to showing crumbling buildings in rural Pernambuco. There's also a mirroring of class relationships from colonial times to the present. At the end of the film, one can't help but wonder how much things have changed. Mendonça, the son of a historian, says he intuitively tries to understand where things come from. "I try not to be nostalgic," he said. Though some people would say the film begins with old pictures, "for me, they're just pictures," Mendonça explained. "That's what we're living now, but in black and white." If you drive 40 kilometers outside of Recife and shoot photos without color, Mendonça told me, you'll get the same images.

The Genre Film Gap

Brazilian genre films aren't taken seriously by critics, Mendonça lamented. There are no Brazilian horror movies, except for Zé do Caixão, and no science fiction; these types of movies are often dismissed as being unrealistic. Mendonça made a choice with "Neighboring Sounds" not to venture into this realm by say, landing a spaceship in the middle of the street. And while it wasn't a horror film, the element of fear was important, and Mendonça created a film that leaves viewers feeling on edge for the entirety of the movie. In the future, Mendonça considers making true genre movies. "I go back to me as a viewer," he said. "It’s basically the kind of thing I would like to see."